


What Was Given

by Letterblade



Category: Sengoku Basara
Genre: Bondage, Breathplay, F/M, not actually as unfortunate as those tags might imply, wild speculation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-08-26
Updated: 2014-08-26
Packaged: 2018-02-14 20:48:41
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,079
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2202564
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Letterblade/pseuds/Letterblade
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Once, before all trust was broken, he stood in attendance upon the Demon King's wife, and she was kind, and had no wish to waste his life.</p>
            </blockquote>





	What Was Given

**Author's Note:**

> My random pairing generator gave me Katsuie, Nohime, and breathplay, so this happened.

In the distant days, before the Mikado's hand opened to him and he shattered his own world, Katsuie stood in attendance on the Demon King's wife. He did not question it. The Lady Nohime loved her lord, she would say; she loved him deep and true, but there were certain wishes that he could not fulfill. That she would not ask of him. "Hah, it would be beyond reason." She laughed, gracious, slipping the pin out of her hair and letting thick black locks fall loose. "I think you must understand."

"He is the great Demon Lord himself," Katsuie murmured. "No human hand may bind him."

"Mm, so it is. Invulnerable, he must always be invulnerable."

Katsuie, in contrast, was mortal. Mortal and thin-wristed and bound hand and foot at her perfumed whim, kneeling with his back against a post so that he would not topple over as she settled in his lap in a rustle of silk that fell too easily away from one long, tattooed leg. He had stripped, at her order; his nethers stood at attention even as his face flushed with shame. "What...what do you wish of me, my lady?"

"Ah, so eager to serve, even when you cannot move. Worry not. I wish...your surrender."

"I serve the Oda. You have received it a long time ago."

She smiled, slight and coy, her voice low. "And your trust, Katsuie. Such cannot be given on command."

He blinked up at her, felt his brow knit, her breath coming short at the warm weight of her draped across his inert flesh. "My...trust?"

She brushed one hand lightly across his cheek, fingertips mapping the planes of his face, one trailing down near his mouth. "Yes. That I bear you no malice, and have no intention of wasting your life. I know you're aware of Mitsuhide's...predelictions. I'm far gentler than him."

He felt himself go very still for a moment, breath thin in his throat. With fear or excitement, he did not know. He was here to serve; all else was meaningless; thus his mind could be clear and calm and without distraction. But--but--

"My life is yours to waste if you so wish." His mouth felt numb on the words; rote, simple fact, his greatest comfort.

"But I do not so wish," she murmured, and nudged his chin up gently to kiss him. He felt his throat tighten with surprise at such kindness, his hands open and fist in their bonds; closed his eyes and kissed back, slow, hesitant. For moments, long moments, it was only that. Her lips were very soft, sweet as the cherries she'd feasted upon. One of her hands slid down to frame his throat, trace the lines of muscle there, and it stirred some strange prickle of fear and surrender down his spine.

He was to serve her. He let his head fall back as she guided him, and bared his throat to her like a yielding dog. Her hands were soft except for the calluses left by the triggers of her guns, strength hidden under the silk of her skin. For a moment, her palm pressed down on his throat, a hair away from choking, and he shuddered and gave some faint whine and did not let himself feel fear.

He did not realized he had closed his eyes until she ordered him to open them.

"Good," she whispered, and slid her hand back up to his face. Pressed it over his mouth as he opened it, though he was not even sure what he would have said, how to accept such praise; perhaps it was a mercy that she'd stopped him. "Keep giving yourself to me like this, as long as you can, and when you can no longer, I will stop."

He would not speak, with her hand so clearly meant to silence him. Could not nod, with his head pressed back against the post he was bound to. Hummed in acknowledgement.

"Good," she murmured again, and there was a faint, dark light in her eyes now, one neither wild nor brutal, but that pinned him in its regard and did not release him. She had not ordered him to keep his eyes on her. Yet he could not look away. Her other hand slid into his hair, messing neatly-combed locks at a touch, gathering up a fistful to hold his head motionless; between the ropes and her body, he could move only his fingers, and moaned muffled into her hand.

She tightened her grip on his hair, and pressed her palm more firmly over her mouth, and pinched his nose shut.

For a moment, nothing felt different. For a moment, he almost didn't realize.

She did not wish to waste his life. She asked for his trust. A bare handful of seconds, the handful that could pass between breaths without notice, if one was calm. His heart pounded.

"Look at me," she murmured, voice sweet as summer.

For a moment, he had closed his eyes. They flew open at her word. As his body strained, ready to breathe, trapped. Weight, weight cloying his chest. He felt small beneath her, flat, a strange haze overtaking his awareness. As if in battle. As if hovering on the brink of death--

His trust. Her gaze was hungry. Almost adoring.

He did not know how long. Perhaps mere moments; his body so insistent, so eager for air. Silk hot and damp against his bare thigh. Uncertainty grew. His chest dry-heaved in the ropes, desperate. Clenching and hollow, spasms of instinct, his eyes terribly wide--

"There," she murmured, right in his pounding ears. "The look in your eyes, this moment when the animal that is your body stirs in terror but the man that is your will surrenders still--"

Her hand lifted.

He gave a huge, choking gasp and trembled under her, rush of relief and air fresh and sweet as wide forests hitting him like a waterfall. She stroked his cheek as he gasped, reeling out of the flattened haze that had overcome his mind.

"That is what I want."

His lips felt foreign, fumbling. He was _aching_ hard against her, he realized sudden and shameful, even as he gasped for air for what seemed like hours until he managed to speak. He barely recognized his own voice, stunned, raw. Such surrender--such surrender was strange, dim joy--

"Then take it, Lady Nohime. As long as you will."


End file.
